NY state senator out to repeal the MTA payroll tax

Now that much of the controversial MTA payroll tax was repealed earlier this month, a New York state senator is once again calling for a forensic audit of the agency.

On Dec. 9, the state senate passed the bill that repealed the MTA payroll tax for 80 percent of the businesses that pay it. However, municipalities and their payrolls were not exempt.

Sen. Greg Ball (R-40th Senate District) was at the Mount Kisco train station this morning saying partially repealing the MTA payroll tax was just the first step.

With a desire to fully repeal the law, Ball says the agency's books must now be thrown open for a forensic audit to see where the money truly goes; "We have to fill in that funding stream. We're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars that could be saved if we finally conducted a forensic accounting."

The tax was enacted to save the cash strapped MTA during the height of the recession but widespread criticism got it partially repealed.

Ball says the state comptroller must immediately conduct the audit with an independent auditing firm.